Despite the hopes for a first win in the Eurohold Balkan League Bulgarians Levski Sofia suffered another defeat at home, this time at the hands of Macedonians Fersped Rabotnicki - 74-83. The expectations in this competition for "The Blues" were high after their win last Friday over unbeatable Lukoil Academic in the local league. But today they were defeated by an opponent that was arguably not as strong as Lukoil, but apparently much better motivated.
It was the third victory in three games for Rabotnicki and their first away win. They are now up to second place in the standings of Group B of the Eurohold BIBL, before tomorrow`s game of Mega Hypo Leasing vs Rilski Sportist. For Levski that was now a third loss in a row and they are still looking for their first victory, with much less of a chance to get into the Top 4 of the Group and advance to the quarterfinal stage.
Fersped Rabotnicki came to this game without three ot their regular players – Serbs Vladimir Filipovic, Nenad Zivcevic and Ersid Ljuca as all of them have temporary problems with their work permits in the FYROM. That fact had negative effect to the team of Levski though, as they underestimated the situation and seemed to think the visitors would give them the victory as a present. Thanks to the lack of concentration of Titi Papazov`s players during the entire first half, the visiting team built a 17 point lead at half-time. During the break the emotional coach of Levski apparently motivated them to come back and try to snatch the victory in an already lost game. They did come back to tie the score in the beginning of the last quarter, but turnovers and bad shooting percentage gave once again Fersped Rabotnicki the lead for good.
Experienced center Toni Simic was the top scorer in the game, leading his team to the victory with 23 points, 6 rebounds and even 4 assists. He also showed his versatility by getting 12 of his points with some great shooting from beyond the arc. Dime Tasovski and Ognen Stojanovski added 17 points each, while Bojan Trajkovski netted another 10.
American guard Marcus Hall lead the scores for Levski with 22 pts, most of which came via drives and lay-ups, while he had a bad night for three - 0/6. His compatriot Dwayne Morton had a double double with 11 pts and 11 rbs. Bulgarian national team members Asen Velikov and Stefan Georgiev scored 15 and 14 pts respectively, both off the bench. The latter also grabbed 7 rebounds, before he was ejected for 5 fouls. FULL STATS OF THE LEVSKI - FERSPED RABOTNICKI GAME
